


Theoretical Physicist

by kristophine



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, M/M, Science Boyfriends, no pepperbroni
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-25
Updated: 2016-01-25
Packaged: 2018-05-16 04:09:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5813503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kristophine/pseuds/kristophine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I’m sorry, sir,” said the airline representative behind her slick gray desk. “There just isn’t anything I can book you on instead. It’s shutting down the whole airport. It could just be a couple of hours, but we don’t know.”</p><p>She seemed like a nice enough woman, and Bruce fought down the welling rage in his throat. Not her fault. He smiled and said, “Thank you for letting me know,” and then went to find a drink.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Theoretical Physicist

**Author's Note:**

> This is the direct result of a series of texts from ecce-meliora during Snowpocalypse 2016 from a Rochester hotel bar. She beta'd it, too, which means I have the best bestie.

“I’m sorry, sir,” said the airline representative behind her slick gray desk. “There just isn’t anything I can book you on instead. It’s shutting down the whole airport. It could just be a couple of hours, but we don’t know.”

She seemed like a nice enough woman, and Bruce fought down the welling rage in his throat. _Not her fault._ He smiled and said, “Thank you for letting me know,” and then went to find a drink.

The airport had a bar, nestled between a Hudson packed full of trashy paperbacks and a vast bank of industrial restrooms. It was half-empty—probably still more full than usual, this time of night on a Tuesday, in deference to the snow that just kept falling outside. He slid onto one of the aggressively modern barstools and waited patiently until the bartender turned around.

“What can I get for you?” asked the bartender, who had what had to be the single worst goatee Bruce had ever seen, hands down. It really detracted from—oh. Oh, a really, really nice face; the kind of face someone ought to be touching. And a flirtatious smile. 

Bruce took a deep breath, let it out. “Can I get a Manhattan?”

“Coming right up.”

While he was waiting, he shuffled through his papers before giving up and pulling out his laptop. There wasn’t anybody sitting next to him. (This might keep someone from sitting down. That might not be a bad thing.) 

The bartender slid the drink across to him, and he glanced up to smile tightly. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” said the handsome bartender, whose nametag read _Tony_ in Helvetica. Bruce turned back to his laptop.

The drink, which he had been expecting to be terrible, was not. It was—it was good. Bruce paused for a minute, letting his eyes unfocus from the screen, and just took a drink. Sweet and sharp. Familiar.

“Is it meeting expectations?” asked Tony the bartender, who was filling a glass from one of the beer taps. 

“Yes, thank you,” said Bruce, and he could feel himself relaxing a little. “It’s very good.”

Tony chuckled almost soundlessly, lips curling in a cocky little grin, and went off with glasses balanced in his hands.

Bruce went back to the paper he was supposed to be editing. (It was, despite his best intentions, rapidly turning into the paper he was _writing,_ because nobody could fuck up a clause quite like Nate, and half the background was explained so badly it was never going to get past a reviewer.) He paused to massage his forehead with his free hand, pushing his curling hair out of his eyes, still clinging to his Manhattan with the other hand. The glass was cool and smooth, and just a little wet.

He realized it was empty, and when he looked up, Tony the bartender was already looking at him. He raised the glass and his eyebrows, trying for pathos, and Tony came back to ask, fondly, “Another one?”

“Please.”

He nursed that one, too, until he had to take a break or murder Nate in his sleep for leaving nothing but gaping holes where the figures should be with the note, _Put figures here._ He took off his glasses for a minute, holding them loosely in one hand, kneading the bridge of his nose. The bar was starting to empty out, people going to find places to lie down and sleep.

“Would you like another?” asked Tony, who was wiping down the bar, slowly dragging the rag across the wood.

“Yes, please.” He sighed. “Better make it my last, though.”

“What a shame.”

This time he watched Tony instead of turning back to the laptop. Tony’s facial hair was ridiculous, goatee shaved into little swirls like the kind of magician you see at shows in Las Vegas, but he wasn’t as young as Bruce had first thought; maybe in his late twenties. Old enough that still being a bartender meant he was probably a drama queen.

“What brings you to the airport tonight?” asked Tony as he dropped the cherry in and pushed it across the bar.

“Trying to get to a conference for work.”

“And what’s work?” Tony wasn’t even making eye contact, just rattling some glasses under the bar.

“Physics.” He cracked a tired grin. “Please don’t ask me about wormholes. It’s been a long day.”

Tony scoffed. “Why would I? Everybody knows Hawking has that shit locked down. Besides, we’re way too far away from practical applications. Robotics are where it’s at.”

“Really,” said Bruce.

“Really! The general public underestimates robots because they aren’t _butlers_ yet, like the Jetsons were the apex of scientific potential.” He was almost bouncing on his toes, up on the balls of his feet. “But I digress. What’s your research on? Your little corner of the cosmos?”

“No offense, but mostly people don’t really want to know that.”

“None taken. So tell me. You’ve been looking at that computer like you want to murder it all night. I take it the project isn’t going so hot.”

“Oh, the _project_ is _fine_. It’s the collaborators.”

“Not holding up their end?”

“Not writing to the eighth-grade level.”

“Ooh, cold burn! What’s the topic, though? At least tell me the title, don’t leave me guessing.”

“The effects of variable radiation types on the utility of doped vibranium in quantum circuits.”

Tony stopped, for once, and held still; there was a crease between his eyebrows.

“You’re seriously looking into vibranium for that?” he said. “I thought doping it was just going to be _way_ too big a pain in the ass.”

“Well, if we bombard it with—”

“It would have to be gamma—”

“Exactly, and then we’d—”

“Oh, you’d really go that route? Okay, but what about when you actually get it fitted in, aren’t you worried that gravity will—”

“No, that’s what we—”

“Oh, oh, oh! Of course, supercooled.”

“Yes, and then—”

“And he’s fucking that up somehow? Or she, sorry, I don’t know what your esteemed colleague is like.”

“He’s not fucking it up, he’s just not _writing_ about it in a way that’s going to get it into a journal.” Bruce reached across the bar and grabbed Tony’s wrist where it had gone still, lying on the wooden bartop, fingers still loosely gripping the damp white rag. “You have to tell me who you actually are, because I do not believe you’re a simple bartender. 

“I’m definitely a bartender, and _simple_ is up for debate.” Tony gave him a quick, mean little grin with gritted teeth and disengaged his wrist. “Just ask my coworkers how thick my skull is.”

“Look, this isn’t _kid stuff,_ I want to know how _you_ know enough about applied physics to have this conversation."

“Lucky guess.” 

“Pardon me for not believing that.”

Tony said, “Oh, look at that, I’ve got a table in need of service. Please feel free to close out your tab at any time, good doctor.”

Bruce waited, stubbornly, until Tony came back, and then said, “I’ll have another of the same, please.” 

Tony’s lips tightened. “I believe you asked me to cut you off after that one.”

“I don’t plan on _drinking_ it, so we both win.”

"I really fail to see how either of us wins in that scenario. Just going to cuddle with a glass full of slowly warming liquor?”

“Just looking for an excuse to keep talking to you.”

“I thought I’d made it pretty clear that I didn’t actually _want_ to keep talking to you.”

“Oh, really? You get a lot of chances around here to talk to people about quantum circuitry? Do you really like robotics?”

“ _Like_ it,” said Tony, with a harsh laugh. “I spent _five years in a doctoral program on it,_ I think I paid my dues. And before you ask, no, I do not want to tell you _that_ story.”

“So you see the applications.”

“What?”

“For the processors. In robots—”

“Well, of course I do. I’d have to be an _idiot_ not to, can you imagine what they’d do for—”

“Yeah, but it’s not just the brain, right? It’s also the interface—”

“What do you m—oh. Huh.”

And it really was that easy, it turned out, to get Tony talking again, and even though his eyes were still flat and angry and he shook his head at Bruce a little, _I know what you’re doing,_ he went along with it. He softened as he kept talking, until he’d throw in a laugh or a smile, in between talking to other customers—and when he did that he’d put on a customer service face and smile pleasantly at them but it wasn’t the same at all, Bruce could see that, _anyone_ could see that.

They killed another two hours like that, and it went so fast that when Tony said, “My shift is up,” Bruce was left scrambling.

“Wait, wait,” he said, holding up a hand.

“No offense, doc,” said Tony, stretching, his button-up shirt riding up a little with creases worn in deeply along the waist, “I’m really looking forward to getting home. My feet are killing me.”

“You should go back.”

“Home? Damn right I should.”

“To a program. You need a doctorate, you need a _lab._ ”

“Academics and I did not exactly part friends, Doctor. I believe I was asked in no uncertain terms not to come back.”

“Whatever lab you were with, they were _wrong._ ”

“And you’ve got a better lab?” Tony crossed his arms, belligerent.

“Not me. I won’t have funding for another grad student for two years at least. But I know people who could—”

“ _Use a bright kid like me?_ Right. Heard it before, not interested. At least drunks are honest.”

“Not like that, Tony. Not because you’re a, a resource to tap.”

Tony leaned forward, then, and rested his hip on the edge of the bar. “Are you sure about that, _Doctor?”_ he asked, and his voice had gone low and smoky, his eyes glittering. Blatant distraction tactic, and Bruce just shook his head and powered through it.

“Because you’re _supposed_ to be in a lab, hell, have a lab of your own, you’re missing out, the _field_ is missing out, you could do _so much_ right now with what we’re doing, _especially_ if your prototype—”

“Leave Dum-E out of this.”

“Look, I’m trying to tell you _whoever shut you out was wrong._ You have a chance to _do_ something with what you know. Let me talk to my colleagues about you.”

“You know what, you _should_ talk to them,” said Tony sharply. “Ask them about _Tony Stark._ Ask them why exactly it was that he got the boot from Stanford. Ask them and then, hell, if you still really want to talk about me, go right on ahead.”

“I will,” said Bruce. “Thanks.”

“Oh, screw you!”

“Tony!” bellowed somebody from further behind the bar. “Language!”

“Sir, yes, _sir!”_ Tony shouted back, clearly furious. “I’m _off my shift now,_ and I am _going home._ ”

“Good luck with that,” said his boss, a bull-necked man, sticking his head out from behind the wine racks. “I hear there’s another six inches of snow.”

“Christ!” yelled Tony with great feeling, and yanked off his apron. He stormed off, but because of the design of the bar that still gave Bruce time to lean over it and yell,

“ _You never took my credit card,”_ and Tony just flipped him off over his shoulder as he banged through the swinging doors into the kitchen.

 

The plane didn’t take off for another six hours, which was more than enough time to a) bitterly regret ever being born and b) google Tony Stark, who, now that he came to think of it, didn’t even know Bruce’s name.

Tony Stark came up from the search results in pieces: a bright, smiling young man at the 1999 Summer Robotics Camp, posing with a hideous but endearing... something; an obituary for Howard and Maria Stark, _survived by_ their son Tony; a triumphant scholarship announcement to undergrad at Carnegie-Mellon; a competition with a self-flying drone where he’d left all the other competitors in the dust. Then a handful of papers with the same co-author taking first place, and all the fun was sucked out of it. The papers were just turning the crank on his advisor’s pet projects. Nothing original. He wasn’t getting to do anything new, anything interesting. Bruce’s hands curled into fists; unclenched, clenched again, slowly. You didn’t take a greyhound and have him go for _walkies in the park._ It ought to be criminal to keep Tony from doing _his_ work, the work he was _born_ for, just stuffing him into a basement somewhere and leeching off his raw horsepower, watching him go quietly insane. Deep breath in through the nose, out through the mouth.

So it wasn’t a surprise, really, to find the arrest record. Throwing a chair through his advisor’s window hadn’t been a good idea. There was no doubt about that.

And that was when the papers ended, and there weren’t any more pictures, and he guessed that was about when Tony the kid genius had turned into Tony the bartender.

 

“Look, Reed,” he said, “I know it’s a big favor.”

Reed bit his lip, turning it over. Bruce could see the gears turning in his head. “You know I’ve been itching to get that next-gen shuttle off the ground,” he said.

“No, no, no. It can’t be like that. He’s got to just be set loose.”

“You want me to adopt this guy like a stray kitten? And hope he doesn’t throw any furniture around? And fund him, on top of that.”

“Yeah.”

“You think it’ll be worth it.”

“Yeah.”

“Hmm.”

 

When Bruce’s plane touched down, there was a feeling in the pit of his stomach that had been growing for hours. It was dread. He didn’t need a feelings wheel to figure that one out, no matter what his therapist said. 

He had no reason to stop before heading home. He could just get a cab and be there. It would be easy. Tony might not be working tonight.

He dragged himself back to the bar, instead.

And there Tony was, leaning on the bar, talking to a woman—a middle-aged tourist, but he was flashing her a smile that had her blushing and fumbling for the tip jar.

 _He’s good,_ thought Bruce, unwillingly.

The bar was busier, a Sunday night a bigger crowd, and Bruce had to squeeze between people to get within range. It gave him the luxury of a minute to just watch Tony; Tony’s hands flashing on the glasses, flipping and tossing them with easy; the line where his undershirt ended and made his button-up a little translucent.

Tony’s head turned, and he spotted Bruce. The look that went over his face was too fast to follow, let alone decipher, but when he’d finished up with the next couple of orders he made his way to Bruce’s spot.

“Well, hello, there, Doctor,” he said. “Same as last time?”

“Not quite,” said Bruce. He’d fumbled the paper out of his pocket earlier, and now he pushed it across the bar. “It’s Reed Richards’ number. Call him. He’ll interview you.”

Tony stared at him blankly. “What?”

“For MIT. He’s kind of a big deal.”

“ _I know who Reed Richards is.”_

“Great, then you know he’s smart enough to Google you before he agreed.”

“I can’t believe—why did you—”

“I told you. You should be in a lab. Your lab.”

Tony drew in a deep breath. “I’m not going to—”

“He isn’t going to ask you to. I told him you just needed room. He’s got some plane he’s working on but you won’t have to.”

Tony was holding the piece of paper carefully by the edge, like it was dangerous.

“Look,” he said, “I’m not saying—I’m not saying yes to this. I don’t know this guy, I don’t know whether it’s the right—you know what, I get off tonight at ten. Wait for me. We should talk about this.”

“Okay, yeah,” said Bruce, already feeling something manic bubbling up in his chest, making him want to smile. Not a _no_ got them one step closer to robot butlers. Whatever Tony said.

Tony grinned at him ruefully. “Seriously, though, you want another Manhattan? I have to serve you _something_ or the boss is going to have my head. We have specialty cocktails if you want.”

“Yeah, you know,” said Bruce, giving up and smiling, “a Manhattan sounds good.”

It was only an hour to wait, and that wasn’t bad. (It _felt_ like he was either up until three in the morning or getting ready for a nap at six in the evening, but that was the problem with timezones and jet lag.) He cracked open his laptop—had to huddle with it this time, pulling his elbows in, filled with sudden penetrating anger every time somebody jostled him carelessly—and fought through some of the abstracts he’d asked people to e-mail him.

When Tony touched his shoulder, he twisted around, and then gathered up his things.

He followed Tony out. Tony was wearing a black leather jacket and frowning—not scowling, though, that was good.

“What was your dissertation supposed to be on? Since that asshole made sure you never got to work on it,” said Bruce. Tony made a face and started talking about the pressing need for self-teaching AIs that would be able to incorporate bodily input and how robots were the obvious vector for that, and Bruce watched him talk, hands flying, building imaginary systems in the air. They filed out past the baggage claim, down an escalator.

Tony was on the possibilities of titanium alloys and their failings, and Bruce was down to mentally unbuttoning Tony’s pants, when they stepped out into the cold air and Bruce shivered.

“Oh, God, I’m sorry, are you cold? That was thoughtless, I’m thoughtless,” said Tony instantly. “I just wanted to talk some more about this, I don’t know, it seemed like a good idea—where do you live? I’ll go along for the ride and then take the cab home.”

“Manhattan. Close to Columbia.”

“See, that works great for me. Let’s do it.”

“All right,” said Bruce, and Tony got them a cab.

The back seat of the cab was warm and close, and Tony said in a low voice, “I just don’t—I spent a lot of time getting used to the idea of never being in a lab again, and this just feels like a _lot,_ a lot to take in, I didn’t really think you were going to talk to anybody or come back and it wasn’t like I even knew your _name_ until I looked you up—”

“You looked me up? Oh, the research, right—”

“Right, how many guys are working on gamma radiation _and_ quantum computing, and you don’t look like Ellis, and then I found your faculty photo from Columbia and I thought, well, see, there you go, it’s this guy, this, fucking Bruce Banner, who apparently just _wrote everything_ on the subject.”

“That’s me.”

“And you’re telling me _Reed Richards_ is just, what, going to give me a spot in his program without, without promises or guarantees, after—after everything? I’m just having a hard time with this.”

“It’s not a given, you have to interview. But you’re going to blow him away and he’s going to love working with you, I can tell.”

“I don’t even know if I _should,_ I mean, it went _so not well_ last time—”

“It’s going to go great, come on. Think about working with robots again. Not whatever you can cobble together at home.” That struck a nerve; Tony rolled his eyes despairingly, wordlessly eloquent, admitting that yes, of course there was a corner of his apartment where he would still be tinkering. “Reed’s lab is a _candy shop_ for you, and he’ll let you play around with all the best stuff. Just go to the interview, okay? Tour the lab and then say no if you want to. Just tell me you’re going to do it.”

“Fuck,” said Tony, “I’m not, am I, am I _Cinderella_ in this scenario, or—”

“You’re definitely not Julia Roberts, if that’s what you’re worried about,” said Bruce dryly, but it was the wrong thing to say. Tony’s eyes widened and he stared at Bruce intently for a minute, and Bruce coughed a little and started to take it back, before Tony reached out and put his hand over Bruce’s.

“I could be, though,” he said, voice going soft and gravelly, stroking Bruce’s knuckles.

“That’s a terrible pick-up line,” said Bruce, “and you really don’t have to do—”

“I get it, I get it,” said Tony impatiently, “but I _want to,”_ and, well, you would have to be a much better man than Bruce to resist that face, idiot goatee and all.

By the time they got to Bruce’s place they were panting and groping each other, and the cabbie had to cough like a small cannon going off before they jerked apart and Bruce paid. (“I _am too_ going to be Julia Roberts,” muttered Tony.)

(“That doesn’t even make _sense,”_ protested Bruce.

“Well, it was your terrible analogy in the first place!”

“Are you coming up?”

“I got out of the cab, didn’t I? Look at me, I have abandoned the cab. Yes, I’m coming up.”)

They made it into the elevator before they started kissing again. Bruce was cold, and Tony’s hands where they were creeping up under his peacoat, over his sides, were cold, and Bruce could not have given less of a crap about that. Tony was very single-minded about kissing, very intense, and it was the best time he had ever had in an elevator, hands-down.

When they got into his apartment (he dropped the keys and had to pick them up, and Tony could have just laughed at him but instead he lunged down to try and help and their shoulders banged together painfully and they knocked over Bruce’s wheeled backpack and Tony bit his earlobe), Tony spared the echoingly sparse living room with its wooden floors a quick glance—“Minimalistic, much?” he said. “Tell me you at least have a bed.”

“I have a bed,” said Bruce, unable to keep the smug smile out of his voice, nudging him toward the master suite and the California king-sized hedonistic nest therein. He went back in for more kisses. Tony pulled his glasses off when he reached for the buttons on his shirt, and then set them on the side table gingerly.

They were getting naked (Tony just flinging his clothes off in random directions, messy but effective, like his work) when Bruce said, “It’s—I haven’t in—”

“Yeah, we’ll—”

“Are you—”

“You should stop talking, I’m offering to blow you,” said Tony easily.

“Oh, thank God,” sighed Bruce.

Tony gave giving head his full attention. It _had_ been a while for Bruce, and he didn’t even try to stop himself from making noise, because it seemed like Tony liked it; every time Bruce sighed or moaned or gasped, every time his hips hitched up and he thrust (just a little, he wasn’t an asshole) into that hot tight wet mouth, Tony would moan a little, too. He was fluttering his tongue, pumping right around the base with his hand so Bruce kept getting that long tight slide and then a wicked tease on the head of his cock. And then Tony seemed to decide he’d warmed up enough, and he took it all in one smooth motion.

Bruce gasped, louder, and this time _really_ tried not to trust; and then Tony swallowed around him, and he came, loud, messily, and long.

“Jesus _Christ,”_ he got out between panting breaths.

Tony laughed. He looked so happy, mouth a little swollen, dragging the back of his hand across it.

“Knew you’d see where I was going with that,” he said.

“What do you want?”

“I—oh, wow, really? Do I get to pick? Is this like some kind of taster’s choice? Because I have to say I would be _thrilled_ with a blowjob but if you wanted to get fucked I would be, you know, _all about that.”_

Bruce thought about it for a second, said, “Still stands that—”

“It’s been a while, yeah, so if—”

“Condom and lube’s in the top drawer.”

Tony lit up like it was Christmas and dug out the supplies, and Bruce clamped a hand down on his wrist: “Give me a second, though!”

“Oh, yeah, yeah, of course.”

Bruce looked down at his hand on Tony’s, softened his grip, and pulled Tony in for some wet, sweet kisses. It was a while before he pulled back and nodded.

“Yeah?” asked Tony, quietly.

“Yeah.”

Tony flipped the lid on the bottle for some lube and then started to press around Bruce’s hole, just gently, at first, and then as Bruce looked him in the eye and nodded, harder; faster; more.

By the time Bruce was ready for it he was hard again (despite the grim knowledge that he was going to be sore in the morning in _so many_ places), and Tony said, “How do you—”

“Face down, what do I look like, a gymnast?”

“No, a fucking weightlifter, I thought physicists were supposed to be nerds,” said Tony, reverently running his hands up over Bruce’s thighs and ass as Bruce turned over.

“I’m a nerd, just check my— _oh_ ,” he said, voice suddenly dropping as Tony pressed the pad of his thumb against him one more time, and then slowly pushed his cock in.

“Shhh,” said Tony, breathing heavily, thrusting very slowly, “you’re ruining the magic.”

“I _stopped_ talking.”

“You’re talking again.”

“You—oh, oh. _Oh_.”

“Like that?”

“Like that,” he got out, and he might have been embarrassed at how his voice sounded except that Tony wasn’t someone to be embarrassed in front of. And besides, Tony was making noises, too, breath hitching, moving so slowly that finally Bruce had to push back for more. That made Tony’s hips stutter, got an explosive sigh.

“ _Jesus,_ ” he said, “you want me to be done before we get started?”

“Not my problem. Suck it up.”

“Already did,” he wheezed, and they both laughed and then had to try harder to breathe.

Bruce wouldn’t have thought he was up for another orgasm, but it hit him when Tony had settled into a thorough but no longer glacial pace, sliding home into him each time, stripping his prostate and leaving him, finally, face-down in the pillow actually shouting.

Tony said, “ _Fuck,_ ” at the top of his lungs, and then came in Bruce, which set off another round of glorious clenching waves in Bruce’s ass and cock, and half-fell, bracing himself with his hands so that his chest was pressed to Bruce’s back. The two of them stayed like that for a minute, both taking huge shuddering breaths.

“That was so nice,” said Bruce with a wide, loose grin, collapsing to the bed. Tony followed.

“Nice? _Nice_? I go to all the effort to _not_ come the second I’m in your tight ass and—”

“Yeah, _nice_ like a tea party, like a maiden _aunt_ —”

“Oh, you are _not_ even going there—”

“Maybe I am, how would you know,” and then they cracked up at each other, laughing, and it felt so good, it was the best thing Bruce could ever remember.

“Stay over,” he said. “You’re here, I have your clothes as hostages.”

“Pretty sure I’m faster than you, but I can do you a favor.”

Tony stole all the covers and snored so badly he _had_ to have sleep apnea, and Bruce couldn’t think of a better way to sleep.

In the morning he said, “Look, if you, uh, if the interview goes well,” and Tony really was on his wavelength, because Tony squinted at him.

“Three and a half hours,” he said. “On a good day.”

“You’d want to—?”

“Do I look like an idiot?”

“Well, with that goatee—” said Bruce, starting to smile, and Tony rolled his eyes but smiled back.

But it was only three and a half hours from Columbia to MIT or the other way around, on a good day, and maybe there could be some good days, he thought.

 

Of course the interview went well.

Tony fit in to Reed’s lab like a missing puzzle piece. Even though he wasn’t directly working on any of Reed’s pet projects, overall productivity shot through the roof. The robots he was designing and cranking out alone had made him well worth Reed’s investment, and the school’s Commercialization Department was already starting to work on the licensing for some of them for industrial use.

There were good days, but not really enough of them.

Tony wasn’t expecting him when he showed up in February.

“Well, Doctor,” he said, flipping up his welding helmet and turning off the laser. “What a pleasant surprise! Is it—I didn’t miss—”

“No, it’s not Valentine’s Day. I don’t think.”

“Good, I didn’t have you pegged for a grand holiday gesture kind of guy.”

Bruce took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I may have made something of a grand gesture, though.”

“Oh, really.” Tony raised his eyebrows and set down the torch. He scooted out from under the belly of the plane on his hoverboard.

“I’ve been offered a position.”

“Really? Where? I can’t imagine it’s any more prestigious than—oh my God, you didn’t.”

“I kind of did.”

“You didn’t ask me?”

“I... was afraid you’d tell me not to.”

“Of course I would have told you not to! It’s insane! You’ve got a dream lab! But holy shit, are you kidding me? You’re coming here? You’re really coming here?”

“Signed, sealed, delivered.”

“Did they at least offer you an obscene bonus?”

“It is fairly obscene.”

“And they’re not going to flip out that we’re a thing? I’m technically a grad student in your department.”

“I told them. They signed off.”

“Holy shit!” Tony started peeling off his gloves, throwing his helmet to the side. “Well, you know what this calls for.”

“A celebratory drink?”

“Lab blowjob.”

“Oh. _Oh.”_

 

The undergraduates loved Dr. Banner. He always seemed a little sad, tragic, really, which gave him a mysterious allure to the straight girls, and his ass alone explained his appeal for the not-so-straight boys. His office hours were always packed, a line back around the corner.

Days when he didn’t have office hours, it was still possible to find him, but undergrads learned _quickly_ that if there were _noises_ coming from the office, you did _not_ try the door to see if it would open. Dr. Banner was _not_ in trouble and neither needed nor wanted your help.

And even if Mr. Stark kept him from throwing things at your head, it still didn’t bode well for your grade.


End file.
